


me and you and a puppy named professor wiggles

by binchmarner, PeaceSign_MiddleFinger



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Cale is suffering, Fluff, Getting Together, M/M, Petsmart Puppy Calendar
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-11
Updated: 2019-11-11
Packaged: 2021-01-27 10:07:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,530
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21390376
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/binchmarner/pseuds/binchmarner, https://archiveofourown.org/users/PeaceSign_MiddleFinger/pseuds/PeaceSign_MiddleFinger
Summary: In which Cale has many,manya feeling about JT Compher with an armload of puppies.
Relationships: J. T. Compher/Cale Makar
Comments: 6
Kudos: 115





	me and you and a puppy named professor wiggles

**Author's Note:**

> thank you to river for listening to the story!!!! we had to write this because. well. come on.
> 
> title of the story is based off the song [Me and You and a dog named Boo.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBL61t2cVY0)

Cale is having… multiple problems.

Unfortunately, all of them have to do with puppies and JT Compher. 

After a hard optional skate after a deserving win, Emily leads the team outside to meet the Petsmart calendar puppies. It’s cold outside, a different cold than Cale is used to from living in Amherst or Calgary. Cale shivers, knowing his nose is red as he grips his sweatshirt.

“Thought you were from Alberta?” JT chirps Cale, smirking. “You’re not goin’ soft on me, right?”

Which is way too much of a thing to think about: JT with his stupid backwards snapback, and borderline uninterested smile as he looks at Cale like he’s got all of JT’s attention. 

Cale’s had a thing, if you could even call it that––you could _definitely_ call it that, a voice says in the back of his head––for JT since he met him before his first game. He’d gone out and done the infamous rookie warmup all by himself in Calgary, and when he looked back, the boys were all skating out after, smug smiles on their faces. 

JT had skated next to him, tapped his stick on the ice next to Cale, and warmed up next to him. It was nice; a player Cale barely knew offering to break his superstitious warmup to help the new kid. Except, he kept skating up next to him, incorporating him into his routine. Cale figured it would probably stop this season, now that he wasn’t brand new, but JT kept it up. 

Cale’s looking too much into it, but, it’s nice to think about sometimes.

“Here’s Tater, Zippy, Hippy, Skippy, and Professor Wiggles,” she says, breaking Cale out of his thoughts, and when Cale looks over, it’s just in time to see JT’s face lighting up. He kneels down on the road to see the puppies, a wide smile on his face. The puppies bark, running over to him, and knock him over.

It’s adorable.

Cale’s having a time.

JT seems unbothered by the fact that he’s in the snow on the road. He’s honest to god giggling as the puppies crawl all over him, licking at his face and hands. His hands look huge as he lifts tiny squirming puppies off of his chest and Cale is absolutely not––he’s _not_––having any feelings about that. 

Puppy pile successfully removed, JT sits up and pulls one into his lap. The little brown puppy immediately chomps down on his fingers. 

“Hey!” JT exclaims, pulling his hand up and out of reach of sharp puppy teeth. “That wasn’t very nice!”

“That’s Tater,” explains the apologetic volunteer from the shelter. “He does that a lot.” 

“Are you a little biting monster?” JT coos at the puppy. “Such a little nibbley boy, huh?” 

His voice, normally deep and bordering on monotonous, is high and goofy as he baby-talks at the puppies and Cale is suffering. Cale makes a high pitched noise, choked off in the back of his throat, and Emily snorts from behind her camera. 

“Doin’ okay there, bud?” Emily asks, smirking. Cale’s cheeks flush from what he hopes he can pass off as the cold as he glares at her.

“I’m fine, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Emily looks like she’s about to answer when JT looks up again, smiling wide.

“Cale, oh my god, come here,” JT says, his voice not quite leaving the excited baby talk. Cale has a bad feeling about this, but walks over and kneels down next to him. He leans in, trying to ignore the fact that he can smell JT’s shampoo, citrusy and way too fancy for what Cale was ever expecting because _shut up, Tys, at least one of us takes pride in our hair,_ and that when he looks up, JT’s staring at him excitedly. 

There’s a different puppy in his lap now, a dog a little bigger. “You have to read his tag.”

“Professor Wiggles, oh my _god,_” Cale says, smiling as he pets the dog. “He’s so academic!”

“Probably has a PhD in adorable, oh goodness,” JT says, nuzzling Professor Wiggles.

Before he can react, Emily is kneeling down in front of them, probably taking photos or a _video, oh god_. It’s going to be great, he’s sure, because JT is basically glowing with happiness and Cale is pretty sure he’s in the same boat. How can you not be thrilled holding a puppy named _Professor Wiggles_?

“Well, it certainly seems like they like you. You boys ready to do some official photos?” The shelter volunteer asks. 

Cale carefully sets Professor Wiggles down and stands up, offering a hand to JT. JT pulls himself up and gives Cale’s hand a squeeze, pairing it with a radiant grin. Cale feels his breath catch in his chest. Seeing JT like this is _a lot_. 

Before he can go jump into traffic about it or something, Emily and the shelter volunteer set him and JT up next to each other, carefully piling puppies in each of their arms. Cale ends up with Professor Wiggles and the infamously bitey Tater, and JT has the other three, who immediately try to escape his arms, much to Emily’s delight. 

“Oh god, oh god somebody help!” JT laughs, squirming to keep all the puppies safe in his arms. Cale smiles widely, his heart tightening in his chest as JT regains his confidence and shushes the puppies gently. Zippy rests her head on Skippy’s back, and Hippy curls up in JT’s elbow, and Cale thinks he’s going to die. 

“You’re some kind of dog whisperer, huh?” Cale asks, his voice coming out fonder than he’d originally meant it to. He doesn’t expect JT’s cheeks to color as he smiles down at the puppies, who are falling asleep in his arms.

“I used to pet sit for my aunt when I lived in Northbrook. It was a nice way to make money, and I loved connecting with the dogs,” he says. “It helps that they’re so cute! Aren’t you!”

Cale can feel his heart melting as he watches JT talk sweetly to the puppies in his arms. “They really are the cutest,” Cale agrees, and Tater nips at his chin in retaliation. “Not you, Tater. You’re very ferocious.” 

JT giggles at him and Cale maybe wants to hear that sound every day for the rest of his life. 

“Alright, boys, stand next to each other so we can get some good shots,” Emily says, and Cale steps closer to JT.

“Where’s Tater?” JT asks, looking at the puppies in Cale’s arms. “Tater’s ready to bite someone.” 

The girl from the shelter tells him Tater is the one Cale is holding closest to him and Cale can’t help but laugh as Tater immediately starts to squirm and nip at his chin. JT backs away jokingly as Cale tucks the puppy closer. 

“Relax, relax. Chill, chill, chill, Tater tot,” Cale urges as the puppy attempts to wriggle his way loose. 

JT coos at Tater, trying to get him to settle. “Tater, it’s okay!” 

Once Cale’s got Tater back under control, JT steps back close and nuzzles at the puppies in his arms. “Oh, now they’re cuddling ‘cause it’s so cold.”

Cale has to bite back a remark about how he would snuggle with JT even if it wasn’t cold out. A puppy calendar photoshoot is definitely not the time to have an embarrassing display of emotions, especially since Emily would totally get it on camera just to hold it over him forever. 

Thankfully, Tater tries to make a break for it, which puts everyone’s focus back where it should be - on the puppies. 

They get through the necessary shots without Cale saying anything embarrassing on camera, and then the puppies get put back into crates so they can be moved inside for shots with some of the guys in the locker room. 

“I shouldn’t get one, right?” JT asks quietly, looking almost wistfully at the shelter crew as they move the puppies. “Like, we’re not home enough for such a little guy, it wouldn’t be fair. But I want one _so badly_.”

Cale knocks his shoulder against JT’s. “I know the feeling. But yeah, now definitely isn’t the time. But I bet Sam would let you play with Tornade whenever. And Gabe would probably love for you to go play with Zoey, now that he has an actual baby to keep him busy. And maybe this summer, we could get one.”

Cale hears the words come out of his mouth and feels his face flush. 

“I mean, I also want to get a puppy. We could go to the shelter together and our puppies could be friends.”

It might just be Cale’s imagination, but JT looks a little pink as he turns and smiles at him. “We could do that.”

Cale flushes and nods. “We definitely should.”

“But,” JT says, raising an eyebrow. “We should start with coffee.”

Cale’s eyes widen. “You––”

“If you want, of course,” JT looks away, back at the puppies. “I think it’s a good start before we actually adopt Professor Wiggles.”

“Coffee first sounds good,” Cale says, “Coffee and then a puppy.”

**Author's Note:**

> if you don't know about the petsmart puppy calendar, you should watch [this](https://www.instagram.com/p/B4s46yyAHjy/) and [this](https://twitter.com/Avalanche/status/1192985154991476738).


End file.
